


What Lies Untold

by AsheRhyder



Series: More Than True [2]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-10
Updated: 2016-09-10
Packaged: 2018-08-14 04:56:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,174
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7999378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AsheRhyder/pseuds/AsheRhyder
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Coaxing the dragon out from under the rubble at Hanamura was only the beginning. Recovery is a slow process, and Genji isn't the only one who wishes it would go faster.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What Lies Untold

**Author's Note:**

  * For [chibimono](https://archiveofourown.org/users/chibimono/gifts).



> Immediately follows "What Lies Beneath". Read that first to avoid confusion.

    It’s a long trip back to the Overwatch base at Gibraltar, and Hanzo spends most of it unconscious. Genji barely has time to make him swallow painkillers before the fatigue takes its long-deferred toll and the wounded man passes out in Jesse’s arms. They strap him in to a gurney, radio ahead to give Angela time to prepare, and set off. Jesse pilots so that Genji can stay close to his brother. Neither of the conscious men talk, and if Hanzo cries out in his sleep — making apologies and howling invectives he would choke to silence were he awake — well, neither of them talk about that, either.  
 

   Hanzo wakes up feverish shortly before landing. He doesn’t recognize Genji, not properly.

    “Please, brother, calm yourself.” Genji’s entreaty is met with a growl.

    “Ghost,” Hanzo snaps. “Come take your vengeance! I will not be found cowering from judgment!”

    “Everything all right back there?” Jesse calls back, slow Southern English drawl in the midst of their rapid Japanese.

    “He has always been the stubborn one,” Genji replies. “Often to his own detriment.”

    “I’ve noticed,” Jesse mutters, just a little too loud to be under his breath. “Try and keep him from hurting himself worse. Mercy will meet us soon.”

    “No mercy for what I’ve done,” Hanzo’s laugh is a terrible, despairing sound, but his words are in English, a little closer to lucid than before. “No forgiveness, no redemption…”

    “That is not your decision to make, brother.” Genji tells him.

    “The stranger said the same thing,” murmurs Hanzo. “Not mine, but the one I killed… he isn’t dead… the man said my brother isn’t dead…” His smile cracks his face, as much pain as pleasure. “I am sure he lies, but I can dream.”

    “Hanzo,” Genji tries to get his brother to focus again, but it’s no use.

      
    The transport pulls into the hanger, and Jesse swings back to help him switch the cot to stretcher mode. Angela waits for them to disembark, but she’s running scans just as soon as they are safely on the ground, not even pausing as she talks to Genji.

    “I can treat him off site, if you would prefer,” she offers. He cocks his head to the side.

    “Why would I want that? He is my brother. He needs me now.”

    Angela generously holds her tongue on whatever her initial thoughts were and instead focuses on her patient.

      
    The next several days blur together. Winston pulls them aside to debrief, but it’s an exercise in obstinance and purposeful ignorance. Genji doesn’t know what happened to his brother because McCree hasn’t told him, and McCree’s report is vague at best and an outright omission at the worst.

    “Where do you find the objective?”

    “Under a rock.”

    “Where was that rock?”

    “Under some more rocks.”

    “How did you know to look there?”

    “Didn’t. Just followed my gut. Had a hankering for something to eat, wandered down a back side alley, you know, the kind where you always find the good old hole in the walls? Dunno what the streets were, paying attention to that kind of stuff is for tourists, but there were these little brown birds hanging out all over the place…”

    Circular deflections, rambling distractions. The cowboy talks a lot but says very little.  


    Most of the time, Genji and McCree sit in the horrible plastic chairs outside the medical ward and wait. McCree talks, a constant reminder that Genji’s not alone, but McCree also listens, managing to snare Genji into distracting conversations that drag the cyborg away from the chasm of silent anxiety.

    “—And man, I thought Amari was going to have my head on a plate. How was I supposed to know Fareeha didn’t know that word yet? Girl practically grew up on base, and it wasn’t like anyone else cleaned up their language none.” Jesse stretches his legs and clasps his hands behind his head, looking far too relaxed. “What was the dumbest thing you two ever did when you were little?”

    “My brother and I once snuck out to see an action film.” Genji says. “I do not remember the title now, only that there was an archer in the film who made a trick shot while hanging upside down from a fire escape.”

    “Oh yeah?” McCree grins eagerly in anticipation.

    “We did not have a convenient fire escape, but there was a tree in the north garden large enough to hold a boy’s weight, if he was careful.”

    “And?”

    “My brother took his bow and hung from the branch. I had his quiver and held on to his knees for balance.” Genji chuckles. “On his fifth shot, I sneezed, and we both fell out of the tree. The arrow went through the door and scared the cook.”

    McCree laughs, deep and rich and restrained only by deference to the fact that Angela will kick him out if he’s too loud.

    “What a picture that must have been.”

    “Yes, but the other shots…” Genji sighs fondly. “They were all bullseyes.”

      
    Angela lets them in to visit once Hanzo’s fever breaks. She has him on fluids and a number of complicated medical devices that have better long-term results than the equipment she carries into the field, but he is stable, sitting upright, and expected to make a full recovery.

    Genji goes in first, and alone. The brothers speak in Japanese, first quietly, then with rising volume, and then suddenly dropping into softer tones again. The few words that Angela and Jesse recognize do little to put the doctor at ease, and the cowboy remains in a state of deceptive, seemingly-relaxed vigilance. Angela flinches when she hears Hanzo’s voice break. Jesse stares at the door and chews on the end of his unlit cigarillo.

    “This was a terrible idea,” she murmurs to herself. “What was I thinking?” She stands and moves to the door.

    “Oh, I dunno,” McCree drawls. “Probably something along the lines that those two got something to say to each other, and that they deserved some privacy to say it in.”

    Angela scowls at him.

    “Privacy is well and good, McCree, but the patient needs rest.” She opens the door, and despite the language barrier, the conversation inside immediately cuts off. “That’s enough excitement for one day, gentlemen.”

    “Ah, of course. Doctor.” Genji is across the room but makes it to the doorway in the span of a heartbeat. Hanzo, on the bed, turns away as he moves. His hair veils his face. “I will come again tomorrow.”

    Hanzo says nothing.

    Angela goes to shut the door, but McCree pops his head in, his demeanor indolent.

    “Hey, Hanzo, hospital food sucks nearly as bad as MREs. What do you want for lunch tomorrow?” He asks. Angela hisses something about liquid diets, but McCree pays no mind and keeps his eyes on the sharp tension in Hanzo’s shoulders.

    “No, thank you,” says Hanzo through gritted teeth.

    “Uh-huh.” McCree’s brow furrows. “Right. I’m gonna give you one chance to call it, or I’m gonna surprise you.”

    “You’ll do no such thing!” Mercy snaps, but Hanzo barks a sharp, short laugh.

    “You waste your kindness on me.”

    Jesse outright scowls at that, a desert thunderstorm of rage sweeping across his face before clearing just as quickly.

    “That ain’t for you to decide,” he says, and then slips out of the doorway without waiting for an answer that isn’t coming.

  
    Genji later finds McCree in the kitchen with Hana, the latter picking at a sandwich between rounds of the game on her handheld console while the former rummages through the kitchen supplies.

    “—four shots, upside down and still hitting the bullseye! What I wouldn’t give to have seen that.” Jesse rambles on, either to himself or to Hana, even while he hangs halfway out of the kitchen cupboard. A clatter of metal emphasizes his less-than-successful attempts to extract whatever piece of cookware he seeks from within.

    “Lena hits plenty of people shooting upside down,” Hana comments, “and you never gush about her.”

    “Lena is moving too fast for the blood to start rushing to her head and gravity to pay her any mind. Superpowers don’t count.” Jesse says as he abandons his excavation. “Oh, hey Genji.” His expression pulls slightly towards strained, possibly leaning towards embarrassed.

    “Good evening.”

    “McCree’s got a shooting crush on your brother,” says Hana, with all the tact of her MEKA landing on someone’s head.

    “You keep running your mouth, girl, and you can get your own damn gaming snacks.” Jesse growls and shakes a wooden spoon at her.

    “That is literally why I have a merchandise deal for chips.” She smiles sweetly, unrepentant. She still shoves the rest of the sandwich in her mouth, though, because McCree makes excellent sandwiches.

    “Will you tell me where the damn pot is already?” McCree menaces her with the spoon again. She just laughs and hightails it before he can actually reach her. “Deal breaker!”

    “You are looking for a specific pot?” Genji peers around McCree and at the assortment of cookware in the cupboard. Interestingly enough, he can see McCree go red even in the periphery of his visor.

    “Uh, yeah, the big one, with the thick base.” He shuffles from foot to foot, uneasy.

    “Are you making chili again? I thought you were banned.”

    “Look, just because Lena and Angela can’t handle a little heat in their food—“

    “Reinhardt cried so hard he threw up.”

    “—doesn’t mean my chili isn’t good. Hana and Lucio liked it just fine.”

    “If I recall correctly, Torbjörn used the leftovers to remove the rust from some scavenged parts.”

    “You know, if you’re just gonna sass me…” McCree brandishes the spoon at him, instead. Genji offers a truce in the form of the sought-after pot. “Ah, thanks.” He rinses it out and measures in fresh water. Genji finds the lid and turns around to see McCree pouring rice into the pot from a bowl previously hidden in the sink. Epiphany jolts through him.

    “Are you making rice porridge?” He asks. Incredulity strains his synthesized voice. This time, Jesse does not go red.

    “Remember that time half the base was down with the flu and the other half were just getting over it?” Jesse puts the put on the stove and turns on the heat. “You mentioned wishing you knew the recipe; said it was good on a bad stomach.”

    Genji cannot, actually, recall the conversation. As one of the few team members unaffected, he was on near-constant missions at the time, trying to cover the forces spread too thin. He knows he doesn’t have the recipe to pass on to McCree; if the cowboy knows it, he looked it up himself. With some attention, too, if he bothered to wash the rice.

    “I am sure Hanzo will appreciate the gesture,” Genji says, just to watch the back of Jesse’s neck redden again. Then, for honesty’s sake, he adds, “eventually”.

  
    Hanzo does not appear to appreciate the gesture, at least not as far as Jesse can tell. There’s a momentary spill of expressions across his face when Jesse pokes his head through the door, each emotion slipping into the next so quickly that they blur together indiscriminately. Then he seems to settle into a stoic resignation just too restrained to be outright dismay.

    “Food’s up,” McCree drawls. He sweeps inside and puts down a tray. Steam curls from under the plate covering a large bowl. He holds up a selection of spoons: tea, table, soup, and serving. “We don’t have any that looked like what was in the picture, so you gotta make do.”

    Hanzo blinks, and curiosity gets the better of him. He lifts the lid and stares down at the creamy-looking rice porridge, inexpertly but lovingly cooked. He turns back to McCree, a protest ready on his lips, and McCree cuts him off by handing him all of the spoons at once.

    “Gotta keep your strength up, if you want to shoulder the weight of the world.”  

    Hanzo exhales a stuttered breath that may actually be a laugh.

    “It was not the weight of the world,” he says. “Only one house.”

    “If you put enough into it, one house can be the whole world.”

    Angela, sensing the weight of the words between the ones they actually voice, busies herself with charts and machines on the other side of the room. It’s not exactly privacy, but it’s not exactly eavesdropping, either.

    Hanzo hesitates, but Jesse is as determined as he was when he first pulled the dragon from under the castle. Hanzo knows that sometimes a tree must bend or break under the strength of the wind. For just one moment, he wonders what happens to trees that are already broken.

    Then he takes a spoon and begins to eat.

    Jesse breathes a sigh of relief. A smile blooms on his face like desert flowers after the rain when Hanzo takes a second, then a third bite.

    “Good?” Jesse asks, and Hanzo nods.

    “Acceptable. You have made this before?”

    Jesse shrugs, and Hanzo’s brow furrows at his deflection.

    “I heard it was good for the stomach. Beats MREs, at any rate, am I right?”

    Hanzo hums in agreement.

  
    For a few minutes, there is quiet in the medical ward.     

    But loneliness befriended Jesse long ago, whispered its secrets into his ear in the ache of empty nights, apologized as its weight crushed him not unlike a falling house. It warned him about the treacherous so-called peace of silence, and it’s not long before he starts talking.

    McCree does not say anything further about Hanzo’s attempts to isolate himself. He has no more words of wisdom, the scant few he scraped together long spent to drag Hanzo out of the ruins. He can say nothing about Genji’s thoughts and feelings that wouldn’t be infinitely better coming from Genji himself. So he doesn’t even try.

    Instead, he talks about the team: Hana’s gaming during missions, Lucio’s taste in music and penchant for eclectic albums, Lena’s quest to find an actually decent cuppa outside of the UK, Winston’s contagious love of peanut butter. He talks about attempting (and failing) to arm wrestle with Reinhardt, about tripping over spare turret parts in the middle of the kitchen, about training exercises that turn into epic prank wars because some of the team members are so damn young it hurts to see them shoot a gun.

    Soldier: 76 may later have some things to say for McCree for revealing information on Overwatch’s agents to someone outside the organization, but until Jack stops playing ‘mysterious loner vigilante’ and owns up to his identity, Jesse feels neither obliged nor inclined to care much about the man’s opinion on operations.

    Jesse’s tone and the the speed of his rambling subtly suggest that Hanzo doesn’t have to reply or even listen if he doesn’t want to, but to Jesse’s surprise, Hanzo contributes attentively.

    “And Hana, I swear, she goes back-flipping out of her MEKA like there’s another camera on her. One of these days, she’s gonna land on her ass, or worse, her head. Flashy moves like that…“

    “A flip would make it harder for an enemy to target her in her dismount,” Hanzo says. “It is more difficult to predict critical shots on an acrobatic figure.”

    Jesse pauses, and Hanzo sips more porridge.

    “Well, yeah, that’s true.” He scratches at his chin, fingers rasping through the bristle of his beard. “Still damn worried she’s gonna fall one of these days.”

    “She will.” Hanzo shrugs. “She probably already has. The fall is inevitable, but from your description of her performance, she has already learned how to mitigate it. You should not let your worry distract you from holding your own position.”

    “Yeah, I suppose.” Jesse sighs. “I just know I was damn lucky that I didn’t catch more bullets than I shot when I was her age. I guess I sorta hoped kids wouldn’t still have to be doing this kind of shit by now.”

    Hanzo snorts, dangerously close to a laugh.

    “You sound like an old man, reminiscing of glory past and lamenting the state of the present.”

    Jesse reels back in mock offense.

    “Hell, that’s 76’s territory!” he gasps. “Guess I better not complain about Lucio’s music, huh?”

    Hanzo raises an eyebrow.

    “If that is the strange, rhythmic noise I have heard passing through the halls, I do not think it counts against you.” He says. “It rattles every piece of equipment your doctor uses.”

    “Hey now, you ain’t seen the half of what he can do. Let me tell you about the time we were all in Illios, trying to hold a point that was three-quarters taken up by a big damn hole in the ground…”

     
    McCree brings lunch to Hanzo every day for a week, usually arriving just as Genji leaves. After spending the morning arguing with his brother over everything from philosophy, to guilt, to even favorite character from some stupid show they both watched as children, it is more comforting than can be put into words that Hanzo does not have to spend the rest of the day dwelling on their conflicts and their inability to come to terms with each other.

 

    Genji catches him in the hall one day. Jesse can’t read the cyborg’s face because of the visor, but it doesn’t stop him from trying. Genji drops his hand onto McCree’s shoulder, heavy and solid.

    “Thank you,” he says, his fingers tight on the cord of muscle between Jesse’s neck and arm. Jesse stares blankly at him a moment. His gaze drops down to the tray he carries, then climbs back to Genji’s metal-masked face.

    A guilty blush creeps up the back of Jesse’s neck and warms the tips of his ears.

    “It ain’t—“ his voice catches in his throat, but he stumbles on. “Don’t thank me. I’ve never been a white hat, and this ain’t exactly altruism.”

    “You didn’t have to do any of this, and yet you did.” Genji’s grip tightens, not hard enough to hurt, but enough that Jesse has to take him seriously. “Thank you.”

    McCree inhales sharply but doesn’t raise his eyes. He nods, and Genji will take what he can get. McCree waits until he’s alone again before giving himself a little shake and heading in to see Hanzo. He’s got a week-long mission coming up, and it’s his last chance to see the man before he leaves.

    When Jesse lets him know he’ll be gone, Hanzo replies that Mercy is about to start him on physical therapy.

    “Aww. Here I was hoping to get to see you doing the little leg-curl things on the parallel bars.” Jesse pouts. Their meals have graduated to solid foods, still blander than the cowboy cares for, but Hanzo promises to one day introduce him to wasabi, and that tides him over.

    Hanzo glares at him from overtop his sandwich.

    “Must you bear witness to my every indignity?” He growls.

    “It ain’t indignity, it’s recovery,” Jesse protests. “Besides, you get this real cute little frown when you’re all determined. No, not that one, that’s your offended one.”

    “You must certainly have instigated it enough to recognize it by now,” Hanzo mutters, but unlike the other times he objected to Jesse’s gentle teasing, this time the cowboy gives him a sad smile and backs off.

    “No offense meant, Shimada-san.” McCree holds up his hands. The curve of his lips looks artificial, like it was carved in the sandstone of his face by an inexpert forger’s hand. “Anyway, I’m sure Angela’ll have you on your feet in no time.”

    Hanzo’s breath suddenly sinks claws into his throat, burning like a coal that sinks slowly down into his chest.

    “And then what?”  
  
    McCree pauses, halfway through cleaning up the tray.

    “And then what, what?” The genuine confusion that meets him should be a relief, but it only serves to make Hanzo more uneasy.

    “What would you have of me, then?”

    McCree opens his mouth, but no words come out, and he closes it again. He huffs, frowns, and purses his lips.

    “I suppose that’s up to you,” he says eventually. “You might want to talk to your brother, but that’s between ya’ll.”

    “You hunted down the monster of Hanamura, pulled it from the wreckage, and rehabilitated it… for what?”

    McCree’s shoulders sag as he sighs.

    “Someone once did much the same for me,” he says, “only they weren’t so accommodating on the bedside manner. I suppose you could say I was paying the universe back for second chances, but… well, truth be told, I came on Genji’s account. Everything else I did after finding you… that was because you looked so damn sad.”

    Hanzo can’t think of anything to say before McCree takes the tray and walks away. He curses himself for that the entire time Jesse is gone.

  
    The mission goes about as well as anything that includes a shoot-out can be considered to go. McCree takes a few flesh wounds from flying debris and the lucky shots of Talon’s better class of goon, but nothing serious and nothing that Lucio’s music doesn’t fix right quick.

    The worst of it comes when a fresh wave of attackers suddenly rounds a corner on their defensive position and Jesse hears Hana’s taunting, “Nerf this!” right before the tell-tale sounds of a MEKA unit about to self-destruct. He wants to turn around, to tell her to be careful, or at least to watch her make her landing, but the image of Hanzo’s severe frown crosses his mind.

    Aww, hell, she may be young, but she’s earned her invite to the team, and it’s high time he respects that. He keeps his eyes on the other door and catches an enemy support unit trying to slip through, which occupies his attention much more thoroughly and, incidentally, is where he gets most of his injuries. The explosion behind him and distinctive lack of gunfire afterwards tell him that D.Va has once more wiped out a unit all by herself. An all-clear over the comms confirms this. Then, and only then, does Jesse turn around and allow himself to check his younger teammates’ conditions.

    Everyone looks healthy and accounted for: no worrisome bloodstains and still possessing as many limbs as they had when they took the field. Hana catches him looking just as he breathes a sigh of relief.

    “All right, _Dad,_ let’s hear it.” She blows a bubble with her gum. “ _‘Don’t do flips to dismount, kiddo,_ ’ or ‘ _don’t taunt the enemy, lil’ darling,_ ’ or is it ‘ _don’t bring candy on missions, Hana,_ ’?”

    Jesse bites his lip because, well, he _has_ said all those things at some point or another, and realizing that he sounds so paternal gives him a cold shiver straight down the spine for reasons he doesn’t much care to examine. Hana raises an eyebrow as he drags out the wait.

    “Nice work taking out that last unit,” he says. Hana frowns, taking his words for sarcasm, and he throws up his hands in a placating gesture. “No, really. I was busy with the sneaky little bastard on over thataway. I’m glad you had the others handled.”

    “Okay, who are you and what did you do with our cowboy?” She stares at him, then hits her comm. “Winston, I think McCree got snagged by aliens and replaced with a bad clone.”

    Jesse sighs and hits his own comm.

    “Negative on the sci-fi, Winston. I just gave D.Va a compliment.”

    Tellingly, Winston hesitates.

    McCree outright scowls.

    “Land’s sake, it ain’t like I’m always yelling at her to eat her veggies and drink her milk like 76, you know? Hanzo just told me—“

    “Oh, well, if _Hanzo_ told you…” Hana breaks back in on the comm line, practically purring. Jesse feels the back of his neck heat up and his cheeks start to warm. “Never mind, Winston. We’re all clear.”

  
    Winston grumbles something about using the comms for serious, mission-related business, but Hana’s already tuned him out. She pats Jesse on the arm, blows another bubble, and gives him a grin that downright borders on lecherous when the bubble pops.

    “Next time I’ll let you take play of the game so you can show your crush how cool you are in the highlight reel,” she promises. It takes Jesse a moment longer than he would like to figure out what she means. He sputters and protests, face flaming, but by then she’s already left him behind to head back to base.

  
    Jesse returns, and Hanzo is the one to hunt him down this time, apparently determined to hold on to their budding tradition. He shows up in the kitchen while Jesse cooks, barely a hitch in his step, and demands that Jesse explain bits of pseudo-colloquial English that get mixed up from various people translating through their original languages. He does this until Jesse relaxes again, his smiles easy and bright.

    They start meeting up in the training room instead of the medical ward or the kitchen. Mercy gives Hanzo strict instructions not to push himself yet. She gives Jesse even stricter instructions not to let Hanzo ignore her strict instructions. The two men spend days going through irritatingly easy exercises, but neither is willing to risk Mercy’s wrath, so they take it slow and work their way through to more complicated and strenuous routines.

    Jesse starts rambling again, about anything and everything under the sun. Hanzo continues to meet him — if not halfway, then at least a third — to contribute enough to make it an actual conversation. They talk about the weather, pleasant at Gibraltar, but always terrible in King’s Row. They talk about the food Jesse’s teammates try to cook, char, or mysteriously acquire. They talk about training, and sometimes they even talk about missions.

  
    “And I know, I know it’s important to hold this point, but I swear 76 has the most bullheaded plan I ever saw. And believe you me, I know bullheaded when I see it. It is the damn stupidest thing in the world to just wait behind the gate for them to come charging through, I don’t care if you’ve got a Bastion unit set up as a turret facing the door. I hate waiting there like that. I feel like there’s always going to be some creepy oni-faced ninja crawling up the wall behind me. Er, no offense, in case you can do the creepy wall-climb.” Jesse groans as he and Hanzo make their third lap of the gym. There’s a slight wheeze to his voice; he really ought to cut back on smoking if he’s going to keep jogging with Hanzo.

    “No offense taken.” Hanzo chuckles. Unlike Jesse, he’s not winded at all. “Genji often took great pleasure in surprising guests by dropping out of the ceiling wearing monster masks.”

    “That little shit,” Jesse grumbles, which tells Hanzo that Genji has not actually broken that habit. He hums contemplatively.

    “Why does he not leave a small defensive force, such as your Bastion, on the point, and then send offensive units to flank and catch your opponents in a pincer?”

    “There’s no good place to hunker down where we can see them before they start shooting at us. If we split up that far out, we won’t be able to get back to the point fast enough. Not in Hanamura.”

    Hanzo slows to a stop. His gaze is distant, as if focusing on some long-ago memory.

    “Ah, sorry Hanzo, I know that’s your old stomping ground.” Jesse’s face crumples with guilt. “I didn’t mean—“

    “Cut through the shops and use the second story balconies,” Hanzo says. “There are a number of places an agile sharpshooter can find good perch, especially on the braces between the buildings and the brace against the tori gate, but there are several stores which will be abandoned if your operation is encountering armed forces during daylight hours.”

    Jesse gapes.

    “Why didn’t 76 think of that?”

    Hanzo shifts uncomfortably.

    “Much of the high ground is optimal for defensive operatives, but the paths are convoluted for foot soldiers. They require high mobility, ah, that is to say, you must be very good at climbing, if you want to move around quickly.” He hops up a few steps on the wall to demonstrate and politely ignores Jesse’s whimper about wall-climbing ninja. “I found these paths to be quite useful in my younger days, when Genji and I—“ he cuts himself off abruptly, a sharp longing latching into his chest. Jesse let’s him fall silent.

    “There’s a story I’d like to hear another day,” he says, as warmly as he’s able. “Balconies and skywalks, eh? Guess Jack’s losing his touch.”

    “I do not mean to undermine your commander—“

    Jesse laughs.

    “76 isn’t my commander,” he says with a casual ease so natural it has to be an old belief. “He’s just an old soldier. He likes to plan ops because he thinks he oughta, not because he’s the best.” McCree shrugs. “I’ll let him know, anyway. Always room for improvement.”

  
    McCree mostly tells Jack just so he can see the irritated twitch to Soldier: 76’s throat that tells him Jack is grinding his teeth. Genji isn’t the only little shit Overwatch has seen over the years, after all. 76 immediately drags McCree into the war room to examine the map. Jesse points out the details Hanzo told him to look for earlier - strategic balconies and overhangs, cutaways of the shopping center where two or three agents can cut through to provide flanking cover.

    “How did I miss this?” 76 sighs in frustration.

    Jesse can’t help himself.

    “Well, you know, old age. Happens to the best of us.” He can tell that, beneath the visor, Jack is glaring at him. “Look, you and me are point men. We charge straight in and shoot down whatever’s standing in our way. This is twisty defender thinking. Don’t feel bad. It just ain’t our style.”

    “Then how’d you come up with it?” asks 76, sharp enough to cut a man at twenty paces. Jesse, standing at only five paces, just shrugs it off.

    “It was Hanzo’s idea. He used to live there, after all, and this is what he used to use.”

    76 shakes his head and growls with frustration.

    “I don’t like you discussing our missions with some… civilian.”

    Jesse’s hackles raise like a rattler’s tail. His eyes narrow, and he takes his hands away from his hips in a slow, deliberate motion before he’s tempted to draw his weapons.

    “First of all, I can count the registered military personnel we got on one hand,” Jesse says evenly. “The rest of us? We’re volunteering out of the goodness of our hearts. That’s all he offered, and that’s all I’m bringing you.”

    76 makes a noise of protest that might be an attempt at an apology, but McCree closes in. They’re the same height and shoulder width, but Jesse is overall thicker, making him a slightly more effective wall even though Jack’s SEP-altered muscles and training would let him floor Jesse in a heartbeat. 76 still tenses at the proximity, and McCree holds his ground.

    “Secondly,” he continues, almost conversationally but for the hardness in his stare, “I appreciate that you feel you gotta look out for our interests, Soldier, I really do. You’re a good man to have on our side; a good shot, and pretty darn clever to boot, but I reckon I’ve been doing the ‘vigilante’ thing as long as you have. I’m a pretty good judge of character, too, and so I’m asking you, one professional to another, to trust me when I say Hanzo’s not a liability.”

    His tone is devoid of a request. It’s a statement, a stance as immovable as the plateaus. 76 doesn’t respond immediately, but none of Jack’s tells are visible under his visor and face mask.

    “You’re really sure of that, considering what he did to his brother?”

    McCree inhales slowly to quell the twister trying to touch down in his chest.

    “That is their business to settle,” he says, “and besides, I’m not in any place to judge. Glass houses and all that, if you know what I mean.” He smiles, humorless and sharp.

    76 just nods, so Jesse steps back and they continue looking over the map as if that moment never happened.

    Days later, when they secure the base and are waiting for their extraction, 76 drops into a crouch near where Jesse tries to sneak a smoke downwind and where he won’t accidentally set the whole base on fire.

    “We could use a sniper on the team,” 76 says.

    McCree raises an eyebrow and puts out his cigarillo.

    “Got any in mind?”

    “I’ve got one I’ve worked with in the past, if I can find her,” 76 says, and Jesse’s blood runs cold for a myriad of reasons, “but I can’t guarantee if or when she’ll come in. Want to talk to your archer about shoring up our defenses?”

    Jesse stares back at Jack and wonders if the man meant to give away so much. But gnawing doubts and ember hopes drown under a wave of surprise and indignation.

    “‘My archer’? He’s Genji’s brother. Genji should ask him.”

    “Nobody’s lobbied for him half as hard as you,” 76 snorts. “Genji’s either with his brother or with that Omnic ‘master’ of his. He certainly doesn’t moon over him all around base.”

    Jesse’s face goes as red as his serape.

    “It ain’t like that.”

    76 manages to convey a pretty good incredulous stare, despite his visor.

    “What the hell are you waiting for?” He demands without heat. It’s the lonely tone of someone who waited too long, and it twists knots in Jesse’s gut to hear it.

    “I have not had nearly enough to drink to discuss this with you,” he says instead, and pulls his hat over his eyes. Jack pats him on the shoulder somewhat awkwardly, probably trying to be comforting.

    “We can’t all be in the business of second chances,” he says. “There’s nothing worse than the things you should have said.”

    Jack means well, which is why Jesse doesn’t call him out on insisting his identity isn’t the world’s worst kept secret. The irony of wanting to hear it from the man himself can wait for another day. Instead, he sinks further into the folds of his serape and tries not to feel like an awkward teenager again.  


    Jesse meets Hanzo for their regular training the day after he gets back from Hanamura. The archer glances across the shooting range when the gunslinger walks in. His gaze is a flickering assessment that Jesse knows well; the same quick scan he still gives his teammates when the fighting is done.

    “Your plan worked like a dream,” Jesse assures him.

    Hanzo stifles his smile, but Jesse catches enough of it to make him break into a grin of his own.

    “Genji has asked me to join your organization,” says Hanzo. He aims and shoots in a single graceful instant, and Jesse whistles appreciatively as it hits the bullseye.

    “What’d you tell him?”

    “I do not think it would be a good idea.”

    “Why not?” Jesse manages to keep the keening whine from his voice but only just.

    Hanzo turns away.

    “I do not think your organization will like me.”

    “Bull.” Jesse steps around so he can see Hanzo’s face.

    Hanzo frowns.

    “Bull? Inside?”

    “No, it means — never mind. They’ll love you.”

    “They don’t know anything about me.”

    “They know plenty. I don’t know if you noticed, but I ain’t exactly tight-lipped about the company I keep.”

    Hanzo blinks, then frowns again, deeper.

    “Then they must know what I did to my brother.”

    “They know that Genji brought you here,” says Jesse in rebuttal, “and that he’s come to see you every day he’s not on a mission. That ought to tell them everything they need to know, and everything else is up to the two of you.”

    Hanzo hesitates in the face of Jesse’s immovable sincerity, but his core is made of forged steel, too.

    “Your commander—“

    “Overwatch, as it is now, doesn’t have a commander.” Jesse says, hard enough to blunt any blade. “And even if it did, it’d most likely be Winston.” He lets out a frustrated sigh. “Do you want to help people?”

    “I do not know that I can—“

    “Ain’t what I asked. Do you want to help?”

    “Genji put it much more eloquently when he asked.”

    Jesse watches Hanzo’s deflection carefully.

    “And what did you tell him?”

    “The same thing I am telling you.” Hanzo takes another shot, this time barely glancing at the target. His arrow still splits his previous bolt. “I want to help, but I fear I have no place doing so among you and your friends.”

    Jesse’s smile is a wild thing, a flash of lightning that cuts through the night.

    “Partner,” he says in a purr like the cleverest of cats, “you just leave that to me.”

**Author's Note:**

> Also on tumblr as one of the [Bad Sleep Twins](http://badsleeptwins.tumblr.com/) or by myself as [deliriumexmachina](http://deliriumexmachina.tumblr.com).


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